Remnants Of A Dying Rose
by stardust-bones
Summary: Zelda-centric drabble set during TP. "It was nights like this- frost-bitten, starless, desolate, twilight-drenched nights- that she missed Link the most." Zelink.


**AN: Written under the influence of insomnia, caffeine, and the song Gave It All Away by Red. This is based of off something I had written a while back in really crummy pen. It was maybe ten sentences and so I thought I'd continue it. It's a bit random and drabbling.**

**I am a large believer in the fact that the Triforce truly has four pieces. I mean there are the obvious three that we've all come to know and love, those are the actual physical pieces, but I also think that the negative space in the middle has to count for something.**

**Zelda's eyes are brown in this fic. Dunno why, but they are. This turned out, unintentionally, similar to a previous fic of mine called Gossamer. Roses and sadness are themes I enjoy to write about, I guess.**

**Disclaimers stand as I own nothing, etc.**

**First fluff scene! Enjoy the breakthrough!**

The sky poured rain in short, melancholy bursts. As it fell through the air, it gathered bits of dirt and soot so when it hit the ground it splattered mud across the cobblestones. The ghosts of what had once been swirled around the raindrops, pinprick lights of little green lanterns.

The wind shook the stone tower in which she slept. It rattled the loose bricks, ruffled the dense ivy, and sent gusts of cold air through the cracks in the mortar. The flags flapped in short bursts, woolen material ripping and cracking at the seams.

The wind didn't just whistle quiet, soothing melodies like the winds of sleepy little Ordon. No, on the contrary it bellowed. Its howls made sounds that made wolfos feel intimidated, not only in tune but in temperature.

From where she lay, Princess Zelda shivered, the howling noise driving her to the point of insanity.

With a rough shove, she threw the once clean covers from her body, leaving nothing to greet her but an empty room, a dead fire, and an onset of the coming winter. She gritted her teeth to keep from gasping, and after pulling it from where it hung on her bedpost, drew her thick ebony cloak around her shoulders.

The article of clothing was an object of mourning. She had worn it the day her parents had died- _were killed_, the voice in the back of her head reminded her- and she would wear it now, until the day her kingdom saw life again.

She quickly checked the bin that rested by the fireplace. Devoid of logs, as usual.

Seeing that there was no hope towards lighting a fire, she headed towards the window. The only one in the whole room, it threatened to swallow its residing wall alive. Ordinary onlookers saw nothing but monochrome stained glass. But Zelda was never the ordinary onlooker. Welded to every frame of metal and every fragment of glass there was a picture.

And every picture tells story.

_The wings of a fairy._

_A lantern dancing with flames._

_A pumpkin, ripe on the vine._

She peered deeper into the grooves of glass, marveled by the frightening and eloquent images that flashed before her.

_A lake, once prosperous like its people, now frozen._

_A cavern stuffed to the seams with lava._

_Piles of forest shrouded by poison._

She wanted to look away. She _needed_ to look away She tried to turn her head, but no matter how much she struggled, she couldn't. The images held her in their grasp.

_A house buried by snow, occupants long gone._

_Smiling child morphed to weeping cripple in a mere moment._

_Soldiers falling to the ground in heap of writhing limbs and bloody metal._

A single tear formed in the corner of a dulled copper eye, dripping down her face in a thin line. "Enough," she whispered in a voice saturated with sleepless, solitary nights and the petals of the wilting rose in the corner.

_In the center, four triangles._

_The King of Evil grinned at the top, eyes aflame, lusty and gore-filled._

_Bottom right, the Hero of Light stood valiant, sword sharpened and ready for battle._

_Bottom left, she was there, staring across the dying kingdom, watching from the window._

_The negative space in the middle, the fragment of darkness that threatened and touched all human life, held the image of a mirror. The Mirror of Twilight emanated the aura of gloom that it would contain until the end of time._

_It was a device built not only from glass and bronze and a welder's crafting hands, but of magic and light and dark, of power and wisdom and courage. The veins of spells that spider-webbed its surface held cloud and shadow, politics and blackmail, pain and lies and murder and death…_

"Enough!" Zelda roared, white-gloved fist making contact with the window and shattering the image of the Triforce that had splayed before her. A mending wound in her palm reopened. Scarlet blood trickled onto her glove, both the blood that ran through her body and the bloodshed that already covered her hands.

She sank to the ground, gasping for air, tears she tried to prevent for so long finally breaking free and spilling down her face.

"Why," she choked out as she sobbed on the floor. "Why does the world have to be this way?"

It was nights like this- frost-bitten, starless, desolate, twilight-drenched nights- that she missed Link the most. She put her head between her hands, cried, and reminisced.

_He sat at the foot of her bed, laughing like he always did. His hair hung in dirty fronds about his face, grimy, beautiful sun-kissed strands that brought Zelda pleasure every time she looked upon them, no matter how disheveled they usually were._

_A rose nestled itself between his fingers. He twisted the stem absentmindedly, following the way the petals danced in the light with ocean-colored eyes._

_When she closed the door behind her, he fell to one knee, raising it like a knight might pass a weapon to a kinsman._

"_For you my lady," he murmured in a voice so dulcet and lilting that for perhaps a second her heart stopped beating._

"_Oh, Link," she breathed, plucking it delicately from his outstretched presentation. "it's beautiful." She scanned the floor, searching for an object that she could use. The glass of water that she had planned to drink earlier was in the corner. She put the rose in there._

"_I don't know what to say." She blushed and stared at her feet. "Thank you. You're very kind."_

_He moved from the bed, bonds of chainmail clinking while he crossed the floor. He took her left hand in his, and with the other he softly grasped her chin and raised her face to meet his._

"_It's for you to remember me by," he spoke in a flash of ivory teeth. "after I leave." His face fell slightly at the edges, molding into a serious look that she hadn't seen in so very long. "You'll take good care of it, won't you Zel?"_

_She nodded, deeply aware of the fact that his thumb was running along her cheekbone. "Of course, Link. With all my heart. Not another flower on this earth shall receive better care."_

"_Good."_

_And then he was leaning closer and closer, and they were sharing the same air and his nose barely brushed against hers._

_In the span of a single moment, their lips met._

_The world fell out from underneath her. Her heart, instead of slowing, sped up, and all she felt was his chapped lips and calloused hands and the warmth of his chest. Passion, happiness, and hope brimmed over within her. Never before had she been so joyful, so truly and utterly alive._

_They broke off, and she buried her head into his shoulder. He kissed her cheek and wrapped his arms around her waist._

"_I love you," he declared in her ear._

"_I love you too," she replied._

Princess Zelda dried her face and pushed herself into a standing position.

She crossed the room in a handful of strides and picked up the glass in the corner.

The stem swam in a pool of stagnant water. The petals drooped, and at the slightest movement of being lifted several of them fell to the ground, twisting in the air.

It used to be fine. It had been growing so well until Ganondorf came into her chamber, furious over something or other. The wisps of twilight that clung to him at all times had surrounded the plant and drained it. It had been dying a slow and painful death ever since.

"Come back Link," Zelda sobbed to the rose. She shook the glass, and several more of the petals fell.

"Please." Four more curled away like flakes of dead skin. "I need you Link."

She deposited it back into its rightful place. She crawled into bed and rolled onto her side. She was just in time to watch the last petal break from the stem, hit the floor, and dissolve into a cloud of dust, destroyed by twilight.


End file.
